Battle of Saint-Mihiel

The Battle of Saint-Mihiel was fought from 12 to 15 September 1918 when the US American Expeditionary Force (AEF) launched an assault on the exposed St. Mihiel salient in northern France during the Western Front campaign of World War I. Saint-Mihiel marked the first time an American army entered battle in Europe, and it resulted in an Allied victory.

Background
A year and a half separated America's declaration of war in April 1917 from the first entry of an independent US army into action in France at St. Mihiel. Appointed commander of the first American Expeditionary Force to be deployed in France, General John J. Pershing sought to assemble, train, and organize an entire mass army before tenring combat. But German successes in May 1918 threatened to finish the war before the Americans arrived and this idea had to be modified. Fighting alongside the French armies, US divisions played a major combat role from Belleau Wood in June through to the Second Battle of the Marne.

Battle
In the summer of 1918, 300,000 fresh US troops were arriving in France every month. By August, about one and a half million "doughboys" (an informal term, with unknown origins, for an American soldier) were learning fighting skills.

In training camps or as combatants in American formations, these men served under overall French or British command. After four long years of costly war, the Allies needed infantry in greater numbers. They were happy to supply the Americans with artillery, tanks, transport vehicles, and aircraft, as long as the Americans supplied men. US commander John Pershing was, however, determined that his troops would not become German cannon-fodder for Allied generals to use up. His aim was to build an independent American army and lead it in a battle planned and commanded by Americans. The US 1st Army was thus created on 10 August 1918.

Pershing agreed with Allied Supreme Commander General Ferdinand Foch that the new army would be used to attack the St. Mihiel salient. This was an area south of Verdun that had been held by Germany since 1941. Something of a backwater by this stage of the war, it was not heavily defended and was therefore a tempting target for a quick success.

American rage
Pershing and his staff wanted to be more than a sideshow, however, and extended the plan to include a follow-up attack eastward to the fortress city of Metz. This would cut major transportation links and take the fighting to the German border. More than half a million US soldiers assembled opposite the salient, along with over 50,000 French troops who were to play a supporting role. Planning and organization were well advanced when, on 30 August, Foch went to Pershing's headquarters and declared he had changed his mind. He wanted US forces to abandon the St. Mihiel operation and instead cooperate with French forces in a major offensive in the Champagne and Meuse-Argonne regions. A furious row erupted, with Pershing refusing to see his army dispersed to provide units for wider Allied operations. It would fight as "an independent American army" or not at all.

Three days later they reached a comrpomise. On 12 September, the US First Army would go ahead with its attack on the St. Mihiel salient but abandon the advance to Metz. Once the salient was taken, the American force would transfer to the Meuse-Argonne sector, where it would lead an offensive, with French support, from 26 September. Pershing thus kept his army together but was committed to fighting two offensives just a fortnight apart.

By this stage in the war the Germans were being forced back to the strongly prepared defensive positions of the Hindenburg Line. Regarding the St. Mihiel salient as indefensible, they began preparing a withdrawal as soon as the buildup of US troops in the sector became evident. This further weakened defenses that stood no chance of resisting an attack of overwhelming force.

Battle commences
In addition to half a million infnatry, Pershing had 267 French Renault light tanks - the majority of them with American crews - under the command of Colonel George S. Patton. The French supplied 3,000 artillery pieces to the offensive. In the air, General Billy Mitchell], the head of the [[US Army Air Service, commanded a force of around 1,400 aircraft that included squadrons from other Allied countries as well as American pilots in British or French-supplied machines. Launched on 12 Spetember, the operation was a precise and effective set-piece attack that took the Germans by surprise.

The battle opened with a four-hour artillery bombardment, followed by the advance of nfantry and tanks behind a creeping barrage. American troops had to force a path through barbed wire entanglements, coming under intersecting fire from concealed machine gun nests, and being threatened by buried mortar bombs strewn as booby traps across their line of advance. Some German soldiers were quick to surrender, but others fought on with great tenacity. Advances from the south and west brought the salient under American control by 16 September.

The end game
Although they suffered 7,000 casualties, the doughboys had come through their baptism of fire well. Logistical support for the men in the field had not been as successful. Inadequate US staff work had led to huge traffic jams developing behind the lines. Many frontline troops went short of food and water because of serious failings in suplies. In the euphoria of a first American victory, however, there was no inclination to analyze weaknesses. President Woodrow Wilson cabled his congratulations to Pershing, writing: "The boys have done what we expected of them, and done it the way we most admire."

Aftermath
Even before the victory at the St. Mihiel salient was complete, the United States was preparing for a larger offensive at the Argonne forest. The Meuse-Argonne Offensive opened on 26 September 1918 as part of Foch's wider plan for concerted Allied attacks to breach the German Hindenburg Line defenses. The transfer of troops and equipment from the St. Mihiel salient to a new front 60 miles distant in ten days was a triumph of logistics. Masterminded by Colonel George Marshall, a future Chief of Staff, the offensive continued until the Armistice in November, by which time the Americans were close to taking Sedan.